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Honduras
Participants on the trip Wade and Dara Gardner Lew, Carol and Levi Stancer Students Amy Renfro and Rebecca (Conroy) Danley About the trip Anyone who has taken a mission trip knows the mantra of “Be Flexible!” We just didn’t anticipate the degree of stretching that would be required on our Honduras trip. Literally as we were walking out the door of our house, things started changing. The airline called because our flight was delayed, and we immediately starting working on options, because this delay would cause us to miss our international connection. An all-night story made short, we ended up missing our connection anyway, and this small airline, with only one flight a day to Honduras, didn’t have seats for us for FIVE more days! Hoping to call each day and get out early, we still needed a place to stay for the interim. We called the associate minister of our home church, and he had a seminary buddy who pastors a church in Miami. We hooked up with Martin Drummond of Miami Shores Christian Church, and they let us sleep at their building and offered gracious hospitality to us. We did physical labor on their building and the next door parsonage, and canvassed the neighborhood, inviting folks to the church’s upcoming block party. We worshipped with the body there on Sunday, and worked for the next three days until we could fly out. And yes, these accidental tourists visited the famous Florida beaches, which were beautiful. Wednesday evening, we flew to San Pedro Sula, in Honduras. We were picked up there by missionaries Jim and Terri Riley, who have been ministering in Honduras for 13 years. They are an amazing team, and are raising four children there, as well. You would know Jim has adapted to being a local if you saw this man drive! I must admit I feared for my life a few times across the mountains from San Pedro Sula to Tegucigalpa, the capital city. After flying and driving all night, we caught a couple hours sleep before heading out to camp. This camp was in a rural area about an hour out of the capital, and was fairly primitive. The toilets had to be flushed by pouring water into the bowl, and although there were showers, there was only cold water in this temperate area. We helped set up camp, including ropes courses and kitchen prep. As students arrived, we met them and tried our rudimentary Spanish on them. There were 12 groups of 10 students, and we were divided up among them. For a total of three days, we participated in small and large group activities, including some high ropes work, skits and quiet times. Wade and Lew each taught two sermons (Wade’s with translation required), and all of us taught individual workshops. It was amazing to see relationships form across barriers of language and culture. After returning from camp on Sunday afternoon, Carol gave an effective seminar on teaching Sunday school for the church teachers. Following that, the Refugio church had their Sunday service, and we did Sunday school for the children. The following day, we visited a private Christian school, and taught them about Colorado, and then basically did a mini-VBS for them for the morning. After an hour of souvenir shopping, we headed back cross-country to the airport. We said good-bye to the Rileys, who were fantastic hosts and who fully give themselves to the work there. We hope to see them again someday!